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Teen birth rate hits all-time low, led by 50% decline among Hispanics and blacks

washingtonpost.com

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Re: Teen birth rate hits all-time low, led by 50% decline among Hispanics and blacks

#111

Post by ScottBurson »

BinaryIdiot wrote: post #107
dpark wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wait, grade school? I certainly hope no one in your grade school was sexually active. If we're talking about things 4th graders believe, they believe all kinds of ridiculous things because they're little kids.

Huh. Today I learned the term "grade school" refers to elementary school (typically K through 5). I had always used it to mean school up to grade 12 (typical graduation). Oops.

Huh. I thought it was first through sixth grade; I wouldn't have included kindergarten.

Re: Teen birth rate hits all-time low, led by 50% decline among Hispanics and blacks

#112

Post by learc83 »

gozur88 wrote: post #18

I wonder how big a role obesity plays in all of this. It may be that teens are having less sex because so many of them have effectively taken themselves out of the sexual marketplace.

The article was talking about drastic declines in the last 10 years. Childhood obesity rates have been stable for the last 10 years (childhood obesity rates include teenagers).

Re: Teen birth rate hits all-time low, led by 50% decline among Hispanics and blacks

#114

Post by sarchertech »

throwawaybookst wrote: post #32

As of this post, three of the 20 comments on this story conjecture that obesity plays some role, and a full half of the comments are on subthreads discussing this hypothesis. Interesting because I've never heard this hypothesis before and other online discussion of this article does not mention obesity.

It's also a bad hypothesis because the article is talking about changes that occurred over the last 10 years, and childhood obesity rates (including teenagers) have stabilized over the last 10 years.

Re: Teen birth rate hits all-time low, led by 50% decline among Hispanics and blacks

#116

Post by visarga »

dionidium wrote: post #105
SmirkingRevenge wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If I were gonna bet on it.. the first explanation I would gravitate towards would be that these teens might have been the children of single teenage mothers/fathers themselves.. and lived through the hardship of that situation first hand.

If I were gonna bet on it, the first explanation I'd gravitate toward is universal, easily-accessed, high-quality pornography .

> the first explanation I'd gravitate toward is universal, easily-accessed, high-quality pornography

Also games and social networks - they drive teens crazy and tempt them to lock themselves in their homes for much of their free time. When you stay at home, you get less sex.

On the whole, teens are replacing sex with more computer time.

Re: Teen birth rate hits all-time low, led by 50% decline among Hispanics and blacks

#117

Post by JacksonGariety »

icanhackit wrote: post #58
JacksonGariety wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> technology has created more social isolation This. If you think that technology has done a good job of informing teens about the risks of pregnancy and the importance of contraception, you are probably being far too optimistic in the face of a dire situation (i.e. mass estrangement).

> a dire situation (i.e. mass estrangement) I don't know - could there be some observation bias given the forum we're discussing this in? It also undermines digital relationships which have their own positives aspects. Here we are having a civil conversation about an important topic without having to commit to meeting at a certain time or place or without knowing what shared interests we have. The internet can act as…

> The internet can act as a social lubricant of sorts which is valuable

Whether or not this is true depends upon the ability of the Arab Spring and Occupy Wall Street to exact change. Things are not looking empirically good for "internet society."

Although I think it's safe to allow for the possibility of an immanent "death of Facebook" which could give rise to the social lubricant you're describing, since I don't think Facebook served the Arab Spring very well.

Re: Teen birth rate hits all-time low, led by 50% decline among Hispanics and blacks

#118

Post by JacksonGariety »

eric_h wrote: post #70
icanhackit wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> a dire situation (i.e. mass estrangement) I don't know - could there be some observation bias given the forum we're discussing this in? It also undermines digital relationships which have their own positives aspects. Here we are having a civil conversation about an important topic without having to commit to meeting at a certain time or place or without knowing what shared interests we have. The internet can act as…

> The internet can act as a social lubricant of sorts which is valuable. The legacy social lubricant is alcohol. That is a very interesting point, though I suspect we'll never actually be able to retire that legacy. If we do, I think it'll take at least a century. Edit: honestly I think the social lubricant is actually pseudonymity, empowered by the network.

> honestly I think the social lubricant is actually pseudonymity, empowered by the network.

Conversely, intoxication is its own kind of real-life pseudonymity! :-)

Re: Teen birth rate hits all-time low, led by 50% decline among Hispanics and blacks

#119

Post by Joof »

gohrt wrote: post #99
Joof wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When I was a teen (10 years ago) a friend of mine was a drug dealer. He dealt morning-after pills to girls who couldn't get them normally.

> drug dealer "street pharmacist"

As a teen, drug dealer was more fun :p

Re: Teen birth rate hits all-time low, led by 50% decline among Hispanics and blacks

#120

Post by orky56 »

gozur88 wrote: post #27
orky56 wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are you referring to obesity in terms of attractiveness or ability to conceive?

I was just thinking in terms of attractiveness. Kids today have an unlimited supply of videos of beautiful people having sex. Not only are their expectations rising, but their choice of attractive mates is falling.

Do you think it relates with what's going in Japan?
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